


Shaibel's

by ForASecondThereWedWon



Series: Oh my god, they were checkmates... [13]
Category: The Queen's Gambit (TV)
Genre: (at least - that's the intention; I tragically do not plan out my work ever), Alma Wheatley is alive, Alternate Universe - Coffee Shops & Cafés, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Banter, Competition, Euphemisms, F/M, Friendship, Past Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Sexual Tension, Strangers to Lovers, William Shaibel is alive, flirting through the medium of chess
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-18
Updated: 2020-12-31
Packaged: 2021-03-11 03:15:44
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 8,164
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28158171
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ForASecondThereWedWon/pseuds/ForASecondThereWedWon
Summary: Beth Harmon is almost the only person who plays chess at Mr. Shaibel's boardgame café, so when she comes in one afternoon to see a chessboard left out on a table, she's curious. When she realizes the half-played game covering its surface is staggeringly, beautifully complex, she's transfixed. She needs to know who started this game, and if they'll be back to finish it.
Relationships: Beth Harmon/Benny Watts
Series: Oh my god, they were checkmates... [13]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2020483
Comments: 150
Kudos: 387





	1. Chapter 1

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  _Oh, my plans didn't work out like I thought/'Cause I had laid my trap for you, but it seems like I got caught_ \- The Marvelettes
> 
> I received a request on Tumblr ([here I am!](https://forasecondtherewedwon.tumblr.com/)) to write Beth and Benny into a modern AU, possibly a coffee shop setting. I didn't think I'd be filling this prompt, but then I remembered board game cafés...

When the proprietor feels his unassuming coffee dive and chess den needs a refresh to keep up with the times, he asks his employees, Matt and Mike, for their youthful suggestions. The twins have been working there since high school and their affection for the shop is part of what caused them to attend college locally—they were able to stay on parttime. Now graduates, they still take on a few weekend and weeknight shifts in order to stay in touch with the place. Whenever they come in, they show their ideas for logos, paint colours, and social media banners to the boss, shaking their heads and smiling when he inevitably agrees to every idea, trusting them with the changes.

Well, those changes go ahead. There are fresh aprons for the staff members the proprietor tries his best to now refer to as ‘baristas,’ a wide array of boardgames (bought cheap, from vintage and second-hand stores) added to the chess sets, and a punny new name on the sign outside. Nevertheless, the shop’s regulars continue to call it the same thing they always have: Shaibel’s.

Beth Harmon isn’t so much a Shaibel’s regular as a Shaibel’s graduate. The proprietor, William, has never taught lessons—he’s no more open to offering instruction on the Sicilian Defence than on how to win a bidding war in Monopoly—except to her. She became his pupil when she first requested (demanded) to learn and retained that status through frequent follow-up visits, during which the ratio of chess pieces moved to words spoken by Mr. Shaibel held at around a hundred-to-one. Now working on her Bachelor’s in mathematics, Beth, like the twins, continues to drop by. One game turns into however many she can coax out of her former teacher. If he isn’t there, she’ll play Mike or Matt, but she doesn’t venture beyond those opponents. Chess is her break from the looser, more harrowing world of math. She likes coming home to her 64 squares and she likes doing it with a friendly face across the table.

Today, Beth walks in and notices something very disturbing while she’s waiting at the counter for her latte: someone’s left a chessboard out. No point asking the café side of the shop about it. They comprise the recent hires, the flakes, the temporaries. The loyal blood-sweat-and-tears staff handle the games. Frowning, Beth swipes away from Cleo’s Instagram (she’s a _model_ and she’s _gorgeous_ and… should Beth get bangs again?), slips her phone into the back pocket of her jeans, and grabs her mug straight from the barista’s hand as he proffers it. A to-go cup? Please. Not for Beth Harmon, not at Shaibel’s. When she comes in, it’s always for a game and a visit. Today, it’s those _plus_ this mystery.

“Mike,” she calls. “ _Mike_!”

She’s here at the wrong time. The right time to see the place busy, but the wrong time for not having to fight for her friend’s attention. The rebranding made Shaibel’s bizarrely trendy and many of the tables are occupied by coffee-drinkers and boardgame-players alike. She eyes a sloping Jenga tower nervously as she skirts around to grab her friend’s arm and rescue him from where he’s explaining Clue for at least the third time, judging by the tension of his arms, hands shoved in his pockets.

“Hey, what’s up the with chessboard?”

He turns and smiles in relief.

“Someone’s been playing.”

Beth blinks slowly and sips her coffee.

“I know, I know,” Mike hedges. “Obvious. But it wasn’t us!”

“But we’re the only ones who use the boards. I’m sure because whenever I haven’t been here in a while, I have to wipe the dust off.”

“Thanks a lot. Are you saying I’m a lazy employee?”

“I _was_ under the impression that you and Matt picked up the slack from the less reverential members of the staff.” She pauses. “Where is Matt? Don’t you guys usually work the same shift?”

Her friend smiles.

“He’s in the bathroom trying to wash a coffee stain out of his shirt.” At Beth’s raised eyebrows, Mike elaborates. “He keeps trying to pick up the new barista and he caught her by surprise today.”

“So she threw coffee at him?”

“No, she just bumped into him.”

“Anticlimactic,” Beth decides.

“Tell that to Matt’s shirt.”

“But… about the chessboard?”

Mike nods and motions her towards that table, which happens to be empty. She figures people must assume someone’s coming back to finish their game. They sit. Doing a doubletake of the position of the pieces as they’ve been left, she _wishes_ someone were coming back to finish it. She’d like to see who belongs to this setup. Whoever it is feels very nonchalant about allowing their bishop to be blocked from immediate usefulness and very confident in their pawns; these have been marched into extremely ambitious placement. The player is obviously either a genius or an amateur who’s misunderstood the value of the various pieces. Beth twists her mug on the table and shifts her gaze back to her friend.

“One guy,” he says.

“One guy played black and white?”

“Yeah. One _great_ player.”

“At least I don’t have to worry that there are two of them lurking around here, pouncing on the chessboards when I’m not around,” Beth says wryly. “Who was this guy?”

“Thin guy. Blond. He got his coffee before he did all this—” Mike gestures to the stunner on the board between them. “—or else I would’ve listened for the name they called out.”

“And did you seem him do this?” She taps the board with her finger.

“Nah.”

She throws herself back in her chair with a sigh. Then, she remembers her coffee and her hand shoots out; she takes a quick gulp. Perfect, now she’ll be even more wired than she already is. Good thing it isn’t an espresso.

“I knew you’d ask,” Mike says sympathetically. “I wish I had something to tell you, but it was yesterday, Saturday. Busy. He was lucky to get a table.”

“You left this here since yesterday?”

“You already bullied me once for not dusting,” he reminds her. “I couldn’t just pack the set up. I mean it’s…”

“It’s fucking Vermeer,” Beth agrees with Mike’s expression of adoration.

They stare at the layout so long that Matt comes out with the brown splotch on his shirt. She waves him off, concentrating on the board, banishing him with the mumbled suggestion of calling her mother. Alma will know how to get the coffee stain out. She’s great with old-fashioned tricks like that. She’s great at fixing things and can tune her own piano, but, to her daughter’s perennial amusement, still struggles with Twitter. Beth assures her mother that she’s better off. Alma’s therapist agrees. No need to prod the corpse of her former depression by leaving her to mingle with the biggest bunch of assholes on the internet.

“Do you think he’ll come back?” She tries to ask casually, but Mike’s leaning forward with an eager look on his face.

“I mean, he’s got to, right? He left it out. He’s gotta finish.” Distantly, she hears Mike speak some more, but he doesn’t catch her attention again until, “Beth?”

She’s been staring at the board. Fixedly. Fingers intertwined and propping her chin up. She doesn’t know this guy, but _she_ can’t just walk away for the game he’s laid out. Because he started the game, she moves black.

“You’re playing him?” Mike asks excitedly.

Beth shrugs—casually, just one shoulder—before sitting back again and cupping her mug in both hands, still studying the board. Her friend scrapes his chair away from the table and bounds over to his brother.

“Matt!” she hears him say. “Beth’s gonna play him!”

 _More than that_ , she thinks, swallowing the end of her latte and tucking a tip beneath the mug. _Beth’s gonna win_.


	2. Chapter 2

“Do you have the free time to do this?” her mother asks cautiously.

Not forbiddingly, but cautiously. Alma accepted that Beth has her own areas of expertise years ago and they try not to step on each other’s toes.

“I’m there all the time anyway,” Beth says, slinging her legs over the arm of the leather chair so she can reposition herself sideways. More comfortable. She misses her mom’s old chairs, but Alma loves ‘changing things up.’ It’s given her comfort, since the divorce, and Beth thinks that’s great, seriously, she just wants a chair that doesn’t squeak.

“Not _all_ the time,” Jolene argues.

Beth lets her head fall back so she can frown at her friend upside down.

“Often,” she counters.

“Beth, you’ve been pretty busy with school this year. It’s why you never hang out with _me_ , remember?”

“First of all, we’re hanging out _right now_ , and second, remember when you were in law school? You passed the bar a month ago and you’ve already forgotten how unavailable you were to be friends with me?”

“It was five weeks ago, thank you very much.”

“Girls,” Alma says with a smile. She loves being included too much to seriously admonish them for bickering. Besides, they’ve always bickered. They’re family.

“ _Alright_ ,” Beth groans, swinging around to sit upright again. God, the squeak. “I’m not even really committing to anything. I don’t know if this mystery player will be back. I don’t know if I’ll still be interested in the game if he does show up.”

“Sure,” Jolene says sarcastically. “You’re probably losing interest already and that’s why there are a dozen books on chess sitting around this room.”

“It’s… been a while since I played a serious game. I love Mr. Shaibel and the boys, but…”

“That’s ok, dear,” her mom says. “Jolene and I are well aware that the average person can’t keep up with you when it comes to chess.”

“At least you tried,” Jolene points out. “Getting that chess app and starting from the beginner’s level. My eyes glaze over by the time Beth’s done reading out the title on one of her books.”

“Oh,” Beth says, “and conversation’s so much more stimulating when we’re discussing _your_ work. I never needed to know what a fucking tort was!”

“You remember something!”

Beth glances away guiltily.

“Well,” Jolene accepts, “you remember the word.”

“This isn’t your work though, Beth,” Alma says.

“What?” Beth asks.

“You made a comparison—this game at Shaibel’s to Jolene’s work as a lawyer. I’m just reminding you.” Her voice is teasing. And knowing. No, there’s nothing to know.

“It’ll be casual! I swear!”

“You’ve never been casual with chess, dear. Ruthless, more like.”

“Merciless,” Jolene offers.

“Driven.”

“Obsessive.”

“ _Ok_ ,” Beth cuts in. “Fine. It’s killing me not knowing who this guy is or when we can finish our game.”

“His game.”

She gives her friend a look.

“He made it our game when he picked Shaibel’s. That’s my home turf.”

“What if he’s old?” Jolene asks.

“Why would he be— Why would I care whether or not he’s old?” Beth corrects.

“Because you wanna fuck him.”

“I’m going to order Chinese,” Alma announces, rising quickly from the couch. “Jolene, the usual dishes?”

They laugh as she hurries from the room, cell already raised to her ear in pretense.

“Don’t pretend to be innocent, Mom!” Beth yells after her. “I helped you set up that dating profile and I know you use it!”

Her eyes meet Jolene’s as she turns away from her mother’s fleeing back.

“Tell me you don’t want to screw this motherfucker because you saw how he plays chess,” Jolene challenges.

Beth sighs and pushes her fingers against her temple.

“I think we fucked mentally right there at the table while I studied his game. Right in front of Mike.”

“If you plan to keep up such acts of public indecency,” Jolene warns, “you might need a lawyer.”

“I knew there was a reason we were friends.”

* * *

_He’s back_ , is the text from Mike that wakes her up before nine.

Instead of replying, Beth sits up and calls him, certain Shaibel’s won’t be busy yet and even more certain that the boss will let Mike get away with taking a personal phone call if he knows it’s her on the other end.

“He’s back?” she demands over her friend’s greeting. “He’s there now?”

“No. He was here yesterday. Before you ask, I wasn’t working. Shaibel was and he’s being about as talkative as ever about it.”

She can hear the eyeroll in Mike’s voice and has to smile.

“I’ll be in soon to see if I can get more out of him. But tell me what happened.”

“With what?”

“The board. It’s still there, right? The game?”

“It is,” Mike assures her. “He moved white.”

“Of course he did.” Beth feels exhilaratingly vindicated. He moved white. He responded. They’re officially playing each other. It’s not just a discarded, aborted chessboard. It’s a match.

She flings her bedding off and looks at the textbooks she left stacked on her desk, aligned beside her closed laptop. Everything ready to be packed before she catches her bus to the university. With a sigh, she turns her back to them and gets dressed instead. She can skip her Russian tutorial.

“Mom!” she calls out as she leaves. “I’m going to Shaibel’s!”

The shop isn’t busy when she arrives; there are just a few people asocially scattered around the space with their coffee orders, one couple. Behind the counter at the far end, where they keep the pieces for the games that are stacked along the wall, Beth spots the twins speaking animatedly to Mr. Shaibel, who’s trapped between them. His wide eyes and absolute stillness are the marks of a cornered rabbit. Huffing a laugh, she goes to rescue him.

“Good morning, Mr. Shaibel,” Beth says, resting her forearm on the customer side of the counter. “Boys.”

“Did you walk over here without looking at the board?” Matt asks, astounded.

“Wow,” Mike says. “Restraint.”

“Well,” she tells them, “I don’t know how long I’ll be looking once I start and I didn’t want to be rude. Unlike you two, who seem to be scaring the boss.”

She gives Mr. Shaibel a sympathetic smile and he retreats without a word, looking grateful.

“Did you get anything else out of him?” she asks the twins when he’s gone.

“‘Fast,’ he said,” Matt offers.

“Like, the guy made his move fast?”

“I’m assuming.”

“We don’t have to assume,” Mike says, shaking his head dismissively at his brother. “Shaibel told me that this guy didn’t even sit down, just came in, went right for the board, and moved the knight. Didn’t order anything either, which is a little tone-deaf. This _is_ a business, not just the place Beth kicks people’s asses at chess.”

“When did Shaibel tell you all that?” Matt wants to know.

“When I was talking to him in the office! He tells me more than you because I don’t badger him.”

“I’ve never _badgered_ him,” he promises his brother, gesturing defensively towards his chest.

“Hey,” Beth says to regain their attention. “Do you think this guy knows?”

“About what?” Matt asks, breaking his glare at Mike.

“That this is the place where I kick people’s asses at chess,” she repeats with faux-arrogance.

“Oh, that’s interesting,” Mike says. “I wonder if he does know.”

“So, _you_ don’t?”

“Nah. As far as I’m aware, he’s never talked to anybody about what he’s doing.”

Beth looks towards the wall, eyes unfocusing as she thinks for a minute.

“Ok, well, I’m gonna go see what he did with that knight.”

“Call us over if you want more eyes on it.”

“Seriously,” Matt adds. “Call us over. We’re getting as obsessed with this guy as you are.”

She rolls her eyes.

“I’m not obsessed with him.”

Starting to walk away, she only gets halfway to the table with the chessboard before she purses her lips and rotates back to the boys.

“By the way,” Beth asks, “is he old?”

Mike cracks a broad smile.

“No. He’s not old.”


	3. Chapter 3

She’s played anonymous matches before. When Mr. Shaibel and the twins are busy at the shop, when she’s sitting in a lecture listening to a prof dissect and overexplain a formula she’s been able to grasp since she was a fucking tween—those are the times when Beth reverts to her chess app. Different from her mother’s, the one Beth uses enables games with competitors from anywhere. Occasionally, she’ll play somebody pretty good. Somebody who’ll put up a fight for as many as two dozen moves. But there’s always the understanding that she’ll never see those people face-to-face, never witness their confidence or the panic that follows swiftly after. What’s driving her crazy about this guy at Shaibel’s is how they must be narrowly avoiding each other.

There was Mike’s text, informing her that the mystery player had been at the shop the day before, and that hasn’t been the only near miss. He’ll move his piece at lunchtime and the twins won’t work until the evening, which is when she’ll stop by and find out he was there. She’ll be at the board first thing on Saturday morning and have to leave because her mother wants her to pick up some groceries; of course, while she’s in line to check out, one of the boys will text that the guy just walked into Shaibel’s. Beth will hurry back. The fucker will be gone.

They dance in and out of tight corners, she and him. She’s never had to work so hard to extricate pieces from situations no one else would dare build around her, too afraid of her lashing out somewhere else on the board. This guy though… this guy she doesn’t seem to scare. If anything, he’s growing ballsier. He strikes at her as though her careful protections and clever formations aren’t even there. He takes her queen and there isn’t an opportunity to take his in return for four fucking moves. Beth _hates_ him as much as she adores him.

Because the entire staff of the shop are now paying attention to his presence, she learns he frequently wears what’s been described to her as a cowboy hat. That completely ruins the image of him she was finally allowing herself to establish in her mind and so what could’ve been an innocuous accessory really pisses her off instead. She burns her hand on a pot lid while making risotto and blames that hat. She sprinkles pepper over the rice and almost lets the dinner scald, distracted as she stares down at the mix of black and white.

The boys tell her he’s a quiet man, this blond cowboy—sometimes moody—and that he dodges their attempts to ask questions. Beth hears about it later when, one evening, Matt gets fed up and asks if it’s personal, if he knows Beth. Apparently, the guy just repeats her name and walks out.

“And smiled,” Matt adds, snagging another slice of pizza from the box on Harry’s kitchen table.

“Guys,” Harry complains with a sigh. “Can we remember to close the box after getting our pizza? You’re letting it get cold.”

“Man,” Mike laughs, “you are _such_ a teacher. You’re ‘we’-ing us again.”

“Well, if you didn’t _act_ like my kindergarteners, I wouldn’t have to _speak_ to you like you’re my kindergarteners.”

Beth’s own slice flops in her hand as she motions for them to shut up, focusing on what Matt said.

“What do you mean he smiled?” she demands.

“If you did it more, you might recognize it,” Mike quips.

She swivels her head to issue a warning glare.

“You know I’m not averse to kicking men in the crotch for telling me to smile, right? My reputation precedes me?”

Nervously, Mike lowers his eyes and scoots his chair away from hers.

“You,” she commands Matt. “Answer the question.”

Matt shrugs.

“What else can I say? He smiled.”

“What kind of smile? Patronizing? Derisive? Was it the smile of an asshole who still thinks chess is a man’s game in the twenty-first fucking century?”

“No.”

“No to which?”

It’s like he’s chewing slower just to taunt her.

“No to all of it,” Matt explains. “He smiled saying your name in, I don’t know, the happy way a person generally feels when they smile.”

“He’s happy because he thinks he can beat me because I’m a woman,” she concludes.

“Beth,” Harry begins soothingly, “I’m sure it’s nothing like that.”

“I’m not sure! I know how he plays chess, but I don’t know _him_. Is it unreasonable to assume he’s an asshole because he plays at that level?”

“Not every great chess player is an asshole.”

“Of course they are, Harry,” Beth sighs. “That’s why you’re not a great chess player.”

“…Thanks?”

Mike raises his hands to indicate Beth as though he’s showcasing a prize on a gameshow.

“Asshole,” he says, presenting her to them.

From experience, Harry knows they’ll behave worse if he argues, so he takes a long drink of his Coke. In the old days, it would’ve been beer, but because her friends are decent people, it’s been pop only at their gatherings since her destructive binge during her first year of university. Alcohol wiped out a month of second semester. It was her brain, her mother and the boys’ babying, and a couple very lenient professors that got her through finals. She’s been sober two and a half years now. Still sometimes an asshole, just not in the way that causes her to grip her life by its edges and tear the whole thing down like an ugly curtain.

“Do you really want to know what he’s like?” Harry asks after swallowing.

“I am curious,” Beth admits.

“Even if he’s an asshole?”

She exhales heavily through her nose.

“Yes. Theoretically, if I knew he was an asshole, I’d want to beat him even more.”

“Trust me,” Matt contributes. “As someone you’ve beaten many, many times—you don’t need the extra motivation.”

She grins.

“Maybe you should ask Mr. Shaibel for lessons.”

“Like he’d give them to anybody but his favourite.”

“Why don’t you meet him?” Harry interjects.

“ _Because_ , Harry,” Beth drones, “we’re never at Shaibel’s at the same time.”

“Have you ever asked him to be? I know you’ve never met him,” he says before she can interrupt, “you don’t need to repeat yourself, but these two have.” He gestures to the twins. “Couldn’t they pass the message along?”

She glances between the brothers, frowning.

“Why haven’t we ever thought of that?” she asks.

“Harry’s always had the best social skills,” Mike suggests.

“That could very well be it.”

“Look,” Harry says, palm flat on the table. He tends to ground himself like this whenever he decides his friends need to be reasoned with. “You don’t need to play this cat-and-mouse game or have Mike and Matt spy on him. Ask him outright. I’m sure he’s as curious about you as you are about him.”

“Unless he’s already written you off as an asshole,” Matt says cheerfully.

“I’m still playing, aren’t I?” Beth points out. “The real asshole move would be walking away from the game.”

“That would probably be the saner thing to do,” Mike says.

The other three stare at him.

“The match is already heated,” he goes on, “and that’s with them responding to each other’s moves two or three times a week. Which is still the maximum, as many times as Beth shows up unexpectedly to see if he’s been there.”

“Thanks for outing me!” she cries, flinging her pizza onto her plate.

“I would text you if he came by,” Mike protests right back. “You _know_ that. Anyway, imagine what the atmosphere would be if you were both at the table at the same time?”

“Not if,” Beth states. “ _When_.”

“Oh boy,” Harry says worriedly. “This could be a bloodbath.”

Matt nods his agreement and adds, “I know. I’m bringing popcorn.”

Mike elbows him, smiling mockingly.

“Cute. Popcorn and something to watch. If you get Kyla to talk to you, it’ll almost be a date.”

Almost a date. Funny, that’s kind of what Beth was picturing too.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In the next chapter, Beth and Benny meet! See you on the other side of Christmas for the update! Until then, please enjoy this meme I made:  
> 


	4. Chapter 4

From the back, he’s everything they described, yet still a surprise by the fact of being real. Beth smooths her hair away from her face and pushes the rest of the way through the front door of Shaibel’s. No bell; aside from the necessary evil of customers, Mr. Shaibel’s always liked the quiet. She keeps her gaze locked on the man at the table. He’s wearing the hat, and she can see the sweep of his blond hair when he turns his head to the right to look at Mike, who’s speaking to him with crossed arms. There’s a coffee mug in the man’s hand and she hears herself inhale when he brings it to his lips.

He’s sprawled fairly casually in his chair, legs kicked out, shoulders down. Probably feeling pretty relaxed. Must be nice. Beth pats her damp palms on her jeans as her heart seems to beat with the noise and thrust of the plane she and Alma took to Paris for their summer holiday.

Mike looks at her first because he’s expecting her and Beth’s eyes shift to the man as he follows her friend’s stare to her face. The way he straightens up seems compelled. She’s reassured to see him lose a little of his cool. The closer she gets, the more she feels as though she’s wading voluntarily into quicksand. His eyes won’t let her go. Would it be blunt to ask if he’s been losing sleep over her?

“You’ve met the welcoming committee,” Beth hears herself say, tilting her head towards Mike without removing her gaze from the stranger’s face.

“Formally,” he nitpicks. His voice is lower, more resonant than she expected. She hides the goosebumps springing up on her arms by clasping her hands behind her back. “He’s talked at me before while I was analyzing the board, but now I can put a name to the pestering.”

“If it felt like pestering, it was my brother talking to you,” Mike says. “We’re twins.”

“So it wasn’t just one guy switching back and forth between outfits every time he came over.” Beth’s eyes dip to the smile he’s mostly suppressing. “Huh.”

Mike sighs and claps her on the shoulder.

“He’s an asshole,” he informs her.

“Well,” she says, “we knew the odds.”

“Hey,” the man complains to Mike’s retreating back. “At least I ordered a coffee this time!”

Swinging his gaze to her friend was the first time he looked away from her since their eyes met, and when it returns to her, she feels a rush of something. Quickly, she slides into the seat across from him and tucks herself into the table. She plants her elbows, interlaces her fingers, and rests her chin on top.

“Pretty,” he comments.

She lifts her chin from her hands.

“Your style of play,” he says. There’s that almost-smile again. He knows what he’s doing, messing with her. “I almost hate to get in the way.”

Beth shrugs.

“It’s chess, after all. Not a jigsaw puzzle. You need someone to beat.”

“Beat?” His eyebrows rise.

“Play against,” she corrects, wearing her own demure smirk.

He watches her for a long moment, then extends his hand over the pretty pattern they’ve been weaving in black and white.

“Benny Watts.”

She shakes.

“Beth Harmon. Have you moved yet?”

“See for yourself.”

He releases her hand and she clenches it into a fist as she withdraws it, in case her fingers tremble. They turn their attention to the board. No, he hasn’t moved. All of his pieces stand the same as they did the last time she was here. Has he been here since? To remember where they left off? To strategize? To just… admire? It feels like they’re creating something, or else why is her pulse working so fucking hard to flood her body with heat and alertness?

“You waited for me?” She lifts her eyes to his face. Benny’s flick to hers in turn.

“I thought you might like to watch.”

Fuck. She hopes the boys don’t try to be nice to her and bring over her usual coffee order; she’s sweltering. Her shoulders jump as she eases her coat off. It’s unclear whether Benny thinks he’s being subtle when his eyes track the movement.

“Ready?” he asks.

He rubs his fingers together like he’s the fucking Salt Bae and reaches for the white rook, his rook. As he grips it, she raises a finger to halt him.

“It’s dusty,” she explains. “The set’s been sitting out for weeks now and these guys are sloppy to start with.”

The smile that accompanies her explanation is brief because she leans forward and blows what’s honestly a miniscule amount of dust from the head of the rook. The expression on Benny’s face is worth it.

“Whenever you’re ready,” Beth prompts, sitting back in her chair.

He slides the rook left with a heavy hand. Hmm, didn’t take anything. This could genuinely be a tactic, but most of the moves they’ve made against each other since this began have been to take, not just reposition. What she would’ve done—what she does do, now that it’s her turn—is let him know exactly what he can expect from this match by doing something to demoralize him. Cut down a piece he wouldn’t have been expecting to lose, put him in check even if she weren’t prepared to maintain it yet. Knock him back on his heels, not coax him close. Because the rook move does that, it pulls her in, and they complete a coy little exchange that begins to feel like she’s chasing him. She leaves a pawn open to sacrifice just to end it.

Benny glances at her pawn, then at her.

“You sure?”

He’s aware that the pawn is a statement against the friskiness of their preceding moves. Unsurprising since she’s never seen someone as in touch with the tone of the game as she is. Is her heart the only one racing?

“It’s touch-move,” she reminds him, holding herself back. “Your turn.”

Is the little rub he gives the length of his bishop before pushing it down the long diagonal really necessary? Beth touches the back of her hand to her flushed cheek.

“You’re running low on these,” he notes, giving the pawn his bishop just took a little toss in his hand before setting it next to the board.

“I don’t need many. I’m resourceful.”

“I bet you are.”

He grins and she swipes his bishop from the board with her remaining knight. She positioned it there for another purpose, but Benny’s driving her to play more aggressively than she typically does in her middlegame. She has the urge to claim pieces—any piece, as many as she can snatch up—and every time she does, she looks to his face. She’s waiting. Waiting to see which one he’ll feel, which piece she can take and be satisfied that she’s taken a piece of him with it. That hate/adoration thing is playing up inside her like her mother’s cough in damp weather.

“How long have you been playing?” he asks. She checks his face, but he’s frowning at the board.

“Not as long as you have.”

“What makes you say that?”

“Like Mike said, you’re kind of an asshole. Too much of an asshole, in my opinion, to have gotten good by playing against friends as an adult. You had to have started young, largely self-taught.”

“You’re half right,” Benny allows. “But I do have friends.”

“Congratulations.”

“I’m taking your queen for that,” he warns, then does.

Ridiculously, this makes Beth smile.

“I’ll get it back. You haven’t taken _all_ my pawns.”

“You’re slippery. I’ll give you that.”

When he looks her in the eye, she feels like she made him do it.

“Am I? I’ve never been told that before.”

“Well.” Benny quirks his head slightly. “Maybe nobody else has made you as slippery as I have. Nevertheless,” he says, glancing down to the board, “I nearly have you pinned. Have you noticed?”

Her pink cheeks feel hotter. First, because of his annoyingly superior tone. Second, because of the implication that he’s distracted her into leaving gaps in her defence. Third and finally, because that’s exactly what’s happened and she’s embarrassed, humiliated, angry. Those feelings land crushingly on top of her careless attraction to this stranger across the chessboard.

“Let’s adjourn,” she snaps, shoving back from the table.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 


	5. Chapter 5

Mr. Shaibel’s in the back, going over the books—books that still _are_ books because he’s a tactile man who prefers flipping a page to squinting at a computer screen—to check the month’s overhead figures. The price of electricity’s gone up, but they’re surviving, selling plenty of coffee. His eyes follow Beth as she barges into the room and paces tightly, biting her lip and scowling at the ceiling. She pulls her phone from her pocket, tapping the name of the second most important person in her contacts list. While she’s waiting for Jolene to pick up, she glances at her old instructor. He motions invitingly to the board he keeps set up. She nods. Ok, she could go for a game.

They proceed steadily with the play, Mr. Shaibel as contained as ever, while Beth catches Jolene up on her match with Benny so far. She’s already told Beth that she’s at work. Beyond the perfunctory reminder, they don’t mention it. What’s Jolene’s large office for if not passing off personal calls as touching base with important clients?

“Nice transition from the Ruy Lopez,” Beth notes as Mr. Shaibel folds his hands in his lap once more, awaiting her move.

“You’re mad that this Benny Watts was trying to play chess?” Jolene asks, returning Beth’s attention to her call. As she presses the phone more snugly against her ear, she lures Mr. Shaibel into a pawn exchange that’s more playful than necessary. She’s not trying to decimate him. He always has her respect on the board.

“I’m mad that he was so smug about it,” Beth explains to her friend. “He felt it too, I know he did, but he had to be a total asshole and make it seem like it was all me.”

“Maybe, just for the sake of argument, that’s not what he meant to do. Maybe he doesn’t lose a lot and being dominated on the chessboard is, like, sexual for him. Maybe he thought you were the same.”

“Turned on by _losing_?” she blurts out. Her gaze shifts to Mr. Shaibel, who’s looking distinctly uncomfortable. Beth angles the phone away from her mouth. “Can we finish later?”

With a sigh of relief, he pulls the shop’s financial records back towards him and Beth rises from her rickety metal chair. She folds it and leans it against the wall. Right where he keeps it for her. Walking to the door, she pries it open enough to peek out into the shop. Benny’s dragged another chair over to their table, just to have something to sling his arm along the back of. She narrows her eyes at him.

“Well, yeah,” Jolene’s saying. “Don’t you think it’s possible?”

“It’s possible,” she agrees, voice lowered now to spare Mr. Shaibel.

“You usually have a good sense for when somebody’s flirting with you. What’d you think? Before he pulled the rug out from under you like that, I mean.”

“He was definitely flirting.”

“If you don’t like how he flirts, push back.”

“I liked it until he thought pinning me down was sexy.”

“ _Come again_?”

“Pinning my pieces,” Beth explains.

“So, don’t let him do that anymore.”

Beth laughs.

“Oh yeah, easy,” she says sarcastically, never looking away from Benny’s serene posture. “I’ll just completely flip control of the game from the best player I’ve ever faced back to me.”

“Good plan,” Jolene says. “You’ll feel like fucking him again in no time.”

“Beating him would feel better.”

“You haven’t been on a date in a while, honey. I think you forget what it can feel like.”

“If he’s any good.” Beth says it like a joke, but her eyes travel over him. The unbuttoned black shirt, the way he runs a finger around the rim of his mug. His foot tapping a slow rhythm on the floor.

“For your sake, I hope chess isn’t this guy’s only skill because you always binge hard after a big win. Even since you quit drinking. Remember last fall? Aced your midterms and decided that same day to get into _Stranger Things_. I didn’t see or hear from you for a day and a half and you were a zombie when I finally did.”

“It’s a good show.”

“I know it is, but a _normal_ person takes breaks for sleep.”

She smiles to herself.

“You think Benny’s my next _Stranger Things_?”

“If I were religious, I would already be praying for his stamina.”

Beth laughs lightly and shifts her gaze up from Benny’s tapping foot. He’s staring right at her through the gap in the door.

“ _Shit_ ,” she says, snapping it shut. “I should get back to the game.”

“I’m sorry, Mr. Wallace,” Jolene replies in a loud, professional tone, “but you know my time is very valuable.”

“Somebody’s being nosy about the call, aren’t they?”

“That’s right, Mr. Wallace. I appreciate your understanding. I’ll be in touch.”

“Would it be wrong to say, ‘fuck you,’ when I know you can’t say it back right now?”

Jolene hangs up on her in answer and Beth laughs, lowering her phone. That helped. Hearing from her friend always helps, whatever the circumstance. Still, it would’ve been great to get one last bit of encouragement. She turns to Mr. Shaibel.

“Do you think I can beat him?” she asks.

He blinks at her.

“I haven’t seen you lose a game in ten years,” he says. “You outgrew me, but all that experience must be worth something. You’ve had the skill required for this game for a long time. Just had to wait for the right person to come along to play it.”

“Thank you.”

Mr. Shaibel nods and bends his head to his spreadsheets.

If Benny appeared at ease when she spied on him, he brightens into clear cockiness as she walks back out, holding her chin up.

“You know what I was just thinking?” he asks, laying his hands on the table and leaning forward as she sits.

“What’s that?”

“It’s a pity this isn’t a timed game.”

“Why?”

He’s going to call her out on running away, seeking moral support to get through the match. Maybe he doesn’t know the specifics—that it’s the strength of her attraction to him that’s grating on her—but she knows it looks childish to call a friend for some long-distance hand-holding just because he got under her skin a little.

“Because I’d love to punch your clock,” Benny says, leaning on the hard final consonant and leaving his lips slightly parted as he holds her eyes.

“That’s a good line,” Beth responds breezily, banging her bishop into one of his pawns as she sets about dismantling the trap he raised around her. “Has it ever worked on anyone you played?”

“Besides you, right now?”

He sounds distracted and she glances up to see the furrow of concentration between his eyebrows. He’s trying to figure out what she’s going to do. She isn’t worried; she’ll be out of this before he marshals his pieces to stop her.

“It’s not working on me because I didn’t need it.”

Benny’s fingers fumble over his rook before he can jerk his hand away. Beth tsks.

“Touch-move,” she reminds him.

“Shit.”

He moves the rook. Begrudgingly. Her words might’ve been a cheap trick to throw him off, but he started it with the clock-punching thing.

“Why be deceptive?” Beth asks rhetorically, picking up her thought. “I want you. You want me too.”

“You don’t think I was being literal about the clock?”

“No more than I think your rook was dusty enough that I had to blow on it.”

Benny smiles.

“No more subtlety?”

“When were we being subtle?” she wants to know.

He nods, checks out her cleavage, and says, “Alright. Let’s play chess. I’ve gotta turn this thing around.”

“Not impossible, but... I have a feeling you’re going to finish sooner than you think.”

“Well, when you keep looking at me like _that_.”

“Premature capitulation is nothing to be self-conscious about,” Beth promises, decisively relieving him of his rook.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The final chapter will be up on New Year's Eve! Thanks to everyone who has read and commented so far! It's been a pleasure to hear your thoughts and share your enthusiasm for this pairing!


	6. Chapter 6

“I want my queen back,” Beth tells him.

She’s completely turned things around on him, capturing some of his pieces and scattering the others. Yeah, he’s attempting to regroup, but they both know she’s already nudged the balance. It’ll be an irreversible shift. She’ll make sure.

“Then come get her,” Benny challenges.

Though she smiles, she isn’t a jerk about it. She already knows she wants to play this man again and being a sore winner definitely won’t secure a follow-up match. Wending her last remaining pawn to the eighth rank requires diligent protection; every one of his pieces is poised to pick her pawn off like starving scavengers on carrion. Beth respects the fight in him. What she plans to do, as he swaps her pawn for her previously taken queen, is make the end quick.

But Benny surprises her. Instead of rebuilding his snares, he tries to trip her into her own. She’s briefly as muddled as Alice in a fan of playing cards, or as another Alice in the heap of their possessions destined for a bonfire. Beth struggles, but she doesn’t lose her grit. She finds some reasoning in his moves and holds onto that. In her mind, the way forward grows clearer. She can get there. If it were any easier, this wouldn’t be the game it’s been—coming up on two hours now—nor would Benny be the player she hoped he was the first time she saw the board he’d laid out. Like a feast, before she even realized she was hungry. She contemplates the path to victory and weighs it against her opponent’s tireless tenacity.

“Draw?”

She’s never, _never_ made the offer to anyone else. Maybe he can tell. Maybe, as his gaze rises from the chessboard to her face, he can parse her expression. Each of her features might have a role as clear-cut as these wooden pieces and he can see that, can master their meaning and map the game’s near future, prophesizing possible outcomes, by eyeballing the distance from the end of her eyebrow to the corner of her lips.

“We’ll play again?” Benny asks, squinting as he seems to consider her and her question.

“What do you think?”

In exchange for her sarcastic retort, he gives her a look that’s such a perfect, impish counter to her words that the feeling of familiarity between them is slow to wilt. It’s weird that she hasn’t known him longer. Picturing the numerous ways their game could unfold has been her exercise every night as she lies in bed. She’s experienced phantom phone vibrations, constantly thinking Matt or Mike texted with news of another sighting. Many of the moves he’s made today are what Beth knows she would’ve done if she were picking up the game from his side of the board and it’s _scary_ to feel so understood.

Did she plan to win? Yes, but she likes the feeling of the draw. It’s different than the tedium of her triumphs over the twins and the frustration of her childhood losses to Mr. Shaibel. Benny sticks his hand out to accept her offer and Beth’s happy to shake on it.

“Was I your first? Draw,” he clarifies, the tip of his finger tickling the inside of her wrist.

She releases a scoffing laugh and takes her hand back.

“I can’t tell if you would’ve beat me,” he muses as they sit there. “Normally, I can.”

“If you can tell you would’ve eventually won a game, why draw?”

Benny shrugs.

“The other player could be skilled enough to start dominating the board again. Or the game might require too much slow, dull work to win. You have to _want_ to continue,” he says, getting a little preachy. He sighs and drops the lecturing tone at the sight of her hard stare. “Or,” Benny suggests more softly, “you can see that the game was never just a game but a longer conversation. Calling for a draw is just like…”

“Like taking a breath,” Beth realizes.

“Exactly.”

“I think we have more to say to each other.”

“So do I.”

Beneath the table, she has her legs crossed and her dangling foot starts to bob. They don’t break eye contact.

“You wanna…” he begins. “…go get a coffee?”

Without turning her head, she glances sideways to the coffee counter and back to Benny. But he knows where they are. Of course he does. She has a feeling he could care less about the coffee.

“Sure,” Beth agrees.

Together, they clear the pieces from the board, stripping away their draw. Benny flips the board over and they pile the pieces into the recessed back. Unlike the weapons from Clue or the tiny plastic cars from Life, the chess pieces are allowed to remain with their board. Nobody wants to steal an old wooden pawn. Nobody plays chess at Shaibel’s.

Beth smiles to herself as she rolls knights to lie flat. Benny’s fingers collide gently with hers. He looks at her and her heart starts to pound. Before he can say anything, she grabs the board and returns it to an empty spot, surrounded by other games. As these more popular choices are selected and returned, the chessboard will gradually make its way to the bottom of the stack. That’s alright. She can find it again and, on the plus side, it won’t be dusty. (Someday, she’ll quit busting the twins’ balls over that, but not any day soon.)

He’s standing next to the table when she comes back to collect her coat. She decides to put it on as they leave the shop, but there’s a moment as she shrugs into it and he reaches to guide her out ahead of him that his hand lands on her lower back and gets trapped. Laughing, Beth slips her coat back off her shoulders to give Benny room to remove his hand. He still takes his sweet time. The heat of his palm lingers.

“So,” she says, letting him hold the door for her. “Coffee.”

“Coffee.”

She already has the jitters.

Benny’s parked down a side street and she stares at the mint-green Volkswagen until she accepts that he’s not going to say anything about his incongruous taste in cars. Beth gets in and closes the heavy door after her. Though the air’s cool, she winds the window down a little, until she can sneak her fingers through the gap and drum them against the outside of the car. She catches him staring at her at a stoplight. She stares back. They drive right past every overpriced café and unfancy chain shop she knows.

He talks to her over the noise of the radio and she responds, twisting the dial so the music gets lower and lower. They escape downtown and the suburbs. To prove this isn’t a kidnapping, Benny cuts across dirt roads instead of continuing in a straight line. She gets a funny feeling and scans the landscape more shrewdly. Tossing out directions, Beth guides him to a clearing and the ruin of a trailer.

When he puts his car in park and kills the engine, she turns from her window to him and takes in his wrist, balanced on the steering wheel. His other arm is wrapped around the back of her headrest. With a quick inhalation, she maneuvers over to straddle his lap. His expression is pleased and unsurprised. His hands slide up her thighs. But when she shifts, teasingly staying out of reach of his lips, she hits her head on the ceiling.

“Why is your car so _small_?” she complains.

“It’s not small, it’s a classic, but we can, uh, play chess again if you don’t think there’s enough room up here.” She frowns to hear he’s giving up this easily, but then Benny smiles slyly. “I have a board in the backseat.”

She laughs.

“I bet you do, Benny.”

As he rubs the tender top of her head, she notices his gaze wander to the shell of the earliest home she can remember.

“You know this place?” he asks.

Beth takes hold of his chin and angles his face back to hers, kissing him experimentally. She smiles, careful to keep her head ducked as she draws back.

“That’s another conversation,” she says, not forbiddingly. A promise. “Now show me that chessboard.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> HAPPY NEW YEAR! [See you on Tumblr](https://forasecondtherewedwon.tumblr.com/ask)!


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